The Car Connection Expert Review

It may look like someone stepped on a Volkswagen Beetle, but the Toyota Echo
is a groundbreaking car in many ways. First, it happens to be one of the first
attempts by Toyota’s Genesis youth marketing group to attract new, younger
buyers to Toyota. Second, it’s maybe the only economy car in the world that
struts out tall-roof packaging, a lightweight steel structure and a small
displacement, high output four-cylinder engine with variable valve timing. To be
sure, the Echo strays far from the status quo in the subcompact segment in the
U.S.

Technology and Genesis influence aside, the real question is whether it’s a
car worthy of your consideration. Despite all the technological and engineering
fireworks it brings to the party, the Echo doesn’t light our sparklers.

Styllng is the Achilles heel of the Echo. By the time the Genesis group was
formed in September of 1998, most of the Echo’s development had been completed,
including the shape. But they were able to make some minor modifications,
including jettisoning the wheel covers for new ones, and adding an overfender
and ground-effects package that imparts a slightly less awkward look. Inside,
the Genesis team tossed out the anemic audio system originally specified for the
car and added an impressive six-speaker sound system with an available
cassette/CD combination head unit.

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Uncool on
campus

Genesis influences notwithstanding, judging by the reactions we have heard,
most still seem to think the car is rather unappealing. In fact, "dorky" is a
word oft heard to describe the car’s aesthetics around college campuses and
Internet chat rooms.

(To be fair, some also said they thought it was "cute," but we have also
heard that word used to describe the now-defunct Ford Aspire as well as the
Chevrolet Metro and Suzuki Swift, cars that won’t grace any Car of the Century
list in this millennium.)

2000 Toyota Echo

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2000 Toyota Echo interior

The Echo’s gauges sit in the
center of the dash — not the first place you might look when
speeding.

To fix the styling, we suggest the radical notion of bringing over the
hatchback variant of the Echo. Toyota’s PR department has openly said they’d
love to see the Echo hatchback in this country in 2001. The European and
Japanese hatchback versions of the Echo, called Yaris and Vitz respectively, are
altogether more appealing to the eye than the Echo. Like the Ford Focus sedan,
another tall-roof small car, the Echo’s lines are rather appealing in the form
of two and four door hatchbacks, but they don’t lend themselves kindly to a
sedan bodystyle.

Opting for the more interesting (and likely more expensive) front-end
treatment of the Yaris or Vitz would certainly be another step in the right
direction. A snazzier set of aluminum wheels, at least 15 inches in diameter,
would go a long way, too. While they’re at it, Toyota could make those wheels a
little wider as well. From the rear, the car appears to be riding on its
tiptoes.

Another quandary presented by the Echo is its modular instrument panel. While
it enables easy left- or right-hand-drive construction, it plops the instrument
cluster in the center of the panel. It’s at least angled toward the driver, but
it doesn’t take an ergonomics engineer to know it’s less than ideal. Our $14,000
tester also had no tachometer, which the company says isn’t relevant to Echo
buyers. We’d disagree.

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2000 Toyota Echo

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Lack of a tachometer aside, the Echo’s interior fit and finish are better
than competitive cars. In addition, the car has an abundance of storage space
inside its interior. And don’t forget that magnificent audio system we mentioned
earlier.

Seating assets

Nonetheless, the Echo’s appearance hides one of the car’s best assets – its
packaging. It seats passengers in a minivanlike position with an abundance of
leg room and excellent forward visibility. That makes piloting the Echo
reminiscent of a small European delivery van and not a subcompact car — a good
thing, we believe.

From behind the wheel, the Echo is a fun car, as well as a roomy one. Besides
getting amazing gas mileage, it is actually quite zippy, thanks to its low
weight and 108 horsepower 1.5-liter engine. But with its training wheel-esque
tire and wheel combination, the Echo is not quite what it could be in the turns.
We think the car would be well served by sportier suspension tuning — and we’re
sure the California crowd will spend good money elsewhere to do it
themselves.

The Echo compares favorably to other subcompacts, cars like the Chevrolet
Metro, Suzuki Swift and the Hyundai Accent. At a base price of $10,450 for the
coupe, the Echo suggests a decent value. But while the base two-door Echo coupe
starts out at that low price, our not-even-fully-optioned test vehicle — an
automatic-equipped four-door sedan — rang up to nearly $15,000. In that
territory, there’s some serious competition from the likes of the Ford Focus,
Honda Civic and Toyota’s own Corolla. Toyota tells us that for the first six
weeks the Echo was on sale, the average transaction price of the car was nearly
$14,000, the hairy outer edge of economy as we see it.

The Echo breaks new ground in the subcompact segment, but that cutting edge
comes at a price. Toyota is banking that customers will pay a premium for
legendary Toyota reliability and for a high-tech engine. But at the bottom of
the price ladder, how many buyers are willing to trade great looks for those
less obvious perks? Only the sales charts will
tell.